Let's Sperg Rule the Waves II: Kiwis at Sea - From Pre Dreadnoughts to the Missile Age, Something is Always Bloody Wrong With Your Ships Today

[Ginger Piglet]

This looks old school, like a 16 bit windows game.

I quite like it.

 

[NerdShamer]

At least Mata Hari is actually good for something, but it looks like everyone is salty over the STDs she gave them.

 

[Techpriest]

This looks old school, like a 16 bit windows game.

I quite like it.

Wait until you see the battle interface and screens. It's straight out of the 90's window scene.

At least Mata Hari is actually good for something, but it looks like everyone is salty over the STDs she gave them.

I've been rather lucky with my spies in some ways. Pity none of them could steal me a 12 inch gun.

As is I'm building a dreadnought that will be quickly outclassed by almost everything. However, I can in the future rebuild it with oil firing and better 11 inch guns, and laugh my ass off at a battle cruiser with 10 11 inch gun broadsides. Cruisers will tremble in fear.

 

[Techpriest]

Good news!

This is a gamble. A very very big gamble. If I'm unlucky, I'll lose my BB. If I'm lucky, I'll just lose budget but everyone will chill out.

Good!

This is good news, if I could afford a light cruiser that is. The brits aren't too happy though.

Fuck you Pasta.

Oh fuck yes. YES. QUALITY 0 12 INCH GUNS. It's time to retrofit some stuff.

The upgrades will keep her relevant into the next decade, hopefully. 8 Months is not too bad a time, and it's certainly cheaper than building a new dreadnought. I'll still need to wait on the upgrades however.

Tension reduction and prestige? It sounds good.

Prestige! Also tension, but PRESTIGE!!!!

Budget, yes!

Budget no! (but better than a war with the British)

Also I designed a better destroyer. Not really worth mentioning much of, but here it is:

We can take the Russians, especially with the help of big daddy Germany.

So with the Germans to tie down the Russians, I need someone to help with the Italians. The French are a natural choice, really. They accept the alliance too, which really helps me out.

I think it's time to start to push for a war, now that I have some big boy allies.

They pay me back quite quickly too.

This is risky, but I'm willing to play the tension game.

YEP. TOTALLY WILLING TO PLAY THE TENSION GAME!

I really, really hope I'll get this thing done in time.

Yes please.

Airships are a new addition to Rule the Waves, and I'll likely end up building an air base or two.

This is also a huge deal. My DD's are now very likely to launch torpedoes in a battle, and actually have them hit.

Yeah no, I'm not tangling with the Brits. Not until the British and French get finished with their battleship and battlecruiser builds.

This is a big deal. It'll save me a lot of weight.

Pasta Delenda Est

I need more capital ships, so I turn to my armored cruiser designers to give me a new one. She's immune to her own guns at 10,000 yards, and has a reasonable displacement at 15,000 tons. She also has maxed torpedo protection, so I don't need to worry as much about destroyers.

I have to take this.

WAR IT IS THEN!

I unfortunately get a bazillion cruiser battles, and I'm not winning those, so I decline battle. We're going to pick and choose here, because otherwise I'll get fucked. But the war can wait for later.

EDIT: I love hearing feedback and ideas on what to try and build, suggestions on designs, even names for ships. Feel free to throw in whatever questions you have about the game or naval warfare of this era in general and I’ll be more than happy to answer it!

 

[RadicalCentrist]

EDIT: I love hearing feedback and ideas on what to try and build, suggestions on designs, even names for ships. Feel free to throw in whatever questions you have about the game or naval warfare of this era in general and I’ll be more than happy to answer it!

Really only thing I can think of is explain why "X" is good ship design and why "Y" is bad

I assume you know what you are doing but with no combat (yet) it's all I got

Also, eat the hat

 

[NerdShamer]

How in the hell are your capital ships getting raped by cruisers?

 

[Techpriest]

Really only thing I can think of is explain why "X" is good ship design and why "Y" is bad

I assume you know what you are doing but with no combat (yet) it's all I got

Also, eat the hat

Ship design is all about compromise and balancing the same trinity as tank design has to - speed, armor, firepower. In my case cost is also a big factor due to A-H being the least powerful of the European powers.

I have to compromise on range to get what I want out of my designs, which is the maximum of armor and firepower (speed for capital ships isn’t the biggest deal right now) I can squeeze into my tonnage limit without breaking the bank. The Wien is a design I’m not the happiest with due to her guns being weak, but I needed a dreadnought as soon as possible. She’ll still easily beat any armored cruiser she faces.

Ship design is also the reason why the HMS Dreadnought was such a game changing design. Firstly, she mounted more heavy primary guns than any other ship either under construction or in service - and her broadside was flat out the largest possible throw weight at the time in primary armament. The Dreadnought was also fast, very fast for a battleship. 21 knots meant she could outrun almost every other battleship in the world. She could dictate her engagements to the enemy, outgunned them (remember that most predreads had 4 gun broadsides. Dreadnought had 8 gun broadsides), and still had 11 inches of belt armor. She was a monster. Everything before her was immediately obsolete. Every battleship design after her that could afford it was modeled after her. B was the original battleship designation, BB was assigned to Dreadnought and those after her, because she was the equivalent of any two previous battleships. They were super battleships.

Dreadnought paid for it though, but she did so in a way that almost everyone else copied. She only had a secondary battery of 4 inches. Most battleships had at least six inches, and a mixed battery at that. That cost weight though, and Dreadnought decided instead to go all in with her 12 inch guns. It was a smart move, as the heavy secondary battery was mostly a product of tradition and a period where armor outperformed guns. The assumption at the time (proved wrong by the Battle of Tsushima) was that engagements between battleships would come down to who was throwing more smaller high explosive shells at the other ship, to set it on fire and force it out of the battle line. This is why some battleships had 8 inch secondary guns, a line of six inch guns along with that, and a bunch of three to four inch guns too.

How in the hell are your capital ships getting raped by cruisers?

Cruiser battles are cruiser on cruiser affairs. I have a grand total of six cruisers, four of which are light cruisers. They have around 7 heavy cruisers. I can take on one or two of their heavies with one of mine, no problem, but if my lights get involved chances are they’re bringing a heavy cruiser I can’t outrun or penetrate with 6 inch guns into the fight - at least until I game the system a bit. That being said, with only 8.5 inches of belt and 2 inches of deck, the Arpads will eventually become vunerable to long range 10 inch guns, and short range engagements with them as well. They’ll be able to outrange and blast holes in them from longer ranges though.

The dynamics of cruiser battles will change as soon as my newest class of heavies is ready to party hard. At 27 knots and a six and a half inch belt, plus 6 10 inch guns, no Italian cruiser will be able to match her. Hell, even early battlecruisers will have problems with the Adria class. She’s faster, better armed, and better armored than anything the Italians could field, and nothing they have can come close to catching her.

 

[Adamska]

Ah, so Rule the Waves does not include "wetness", roll, and so on then it sounds like, which makes it a far more accessible game than I first thought it was. I've dicked around in Springsharp (which allows you to build boats) a few times and all of those were pains to navigate since I don't know why x design causes that shit, or why that type of gun is shit.

Also since this is Italy sperging about Greece and wanting Dalmatian clay too:

 

[Techpriest]

So, I'm at war with Italy. I'm also blockading them right now. Why?

For adjusted tonnage, I'm winning. That battleship of mine counts double. I've got a load of submarines. And, critically, I've got both the French and the Germans hosting some ships in the Med, which essentially shuts down their ability to raid me as effectively

Here's a list of the ships I currently have in active duty. To deal with the issue of my light cruisers being outmatched, I've set my two older ships to trade protection - they'll deter any raiding CLs from the Italians from engaging. The other two I've set as raiders themselves. They're a little slow, but with the firepower they bring to the table, they're more than a match for any destroyer escorts the Italians will have. With the French ports open to me, I don't need to worry as much about their supplies either.

Also, I forgot to add in, but sometimes your designs can get a beneficial discovery. In the case of the Wien, her design was found to easily match and even exceed my desired 21 knots. She's now the fastest battleship in the world.

Worryingly, Italy is building two battlecruisers. My Arida's will be a match for them most likely, but the Sankt Georg class won't be. Battlecruisers get involved in cruiser engagements. I have a timetable of effectiveness here. Our budgets are similar. But they don't have friends, and the friends I have are tough cookies. Austrian diplomatic efforts have been spectacular, convincing the French that the Italians aren't worth allying with and that the Germans aren't going to attack them when they risk being stabbed in the back by Austria-Hungary. Also, don't we all dislike the British?

My first Zrinyi class battleship is about a year and a half away. I'm confident she'll outgun anything the Italians can build, even if they're using larger guns. Quality 0 is a massive step up over quality -1. All the engineers at Skoda deserve a medal for giving me those guns.

Denying the enemy battle has cost me a bit in victory points. However, I have a secret weapon the Italians can't match.

The Italians have 2 more submarines than I do, true, but only 4 of them are even close to 50% reliability - the rest are all older models. To top that all off, with the amount of destroyers I'm fielding, enemy submarine effectiveness is sharply reduced. I'll design some Corvettes too, to better hunt down the Italian boats in future., and sweep mines.

I make some adjustments to my naval research and budget - an extra 100 hungabucks a month means I can maintain my budget longer. Submarines are going to be a key factor in this war, and in keeping the blockade on Italy or breaking a blockade on me in the future. I can't ignore that. Right now though, I've got an advantage, and I'm going to press it. If I can take a couple Italian holdings off of them (Libya and Rhodes are my targets), I can have ships stationed outside of the Adriatic ready to fight the Italians for the Eastern Mediterranean. That's why I wanted Greece. Extra holdings means extra income, which means a larger budget without risking unrest.

I click next turn, and see what the game is offering.

Italian shipping is getting ravaged. My submarines rack up an impressive harvest. 8 merchant ships, more than my two surface raiders. The Italians only manage to find and sink a single one of mine. This is going to really hurt them as the war continues, if I keep killing 12 a turn.

The Germans either are raiding the Med as well, or starting a fight in the Alps to support the Austrian-Hungarian forces.

I'll take a coastal raid. Nothing they've got strikes real fear into my heart now.

Welcome to the battle interface of Rule the Waves. As you can see here, we're starting the battle at 3 in the afternoon. My entire battle line has come out to play today, and I can only assume the Italian line has as well. I'm looking at a 2:1 ratio in ships, but I have a feeling mine are better. The Kaiser class will do serious damage with her heavy mixed battery, and the Arpad's can and will punch holes in everything the Austrians can offer. Plus, the Kaisers have 11 inches of belt armor - not even the Arpad's improved guns can penetrate that beyond around 6000 yards.

The target today is on the Italian East Coast, around the real life town of Vieste. A beautiful place, it's unfortunately in this timeline quite close to a point of interest we want to blow to bits. Whatever it is doesn't matter. It must be destroyed.

The K.u.K Maria Theresia sights an unknown ship. At 23 knots, they're fast enough that I feel comfortable using my heavy cruisers as a scouting force. Their armor could be better, true, but I'd like to see what we've found.

It seems as though the Italians have sortied from Bari to intercept my forces. I adjust course back towards the objective - as long as my battlewagons arrive there, I'll be fine.

The Italians respond by starting an intercept course, and their heavy cruiser comes into range. I can identify their ships now.

Their armored cruiser isn't much special.

The Cristoforo Columbo is however, roughly equal to the Wien. However, her broadside is weaker, and her bigger secondaries aren't armored quite as well. 13 inch guns do pack a wallop though, but probably not enough to penetrate the Wien's belt. I'll need to be careful.

Both the wien and kaiser however, laugh at their pitiful excuses for battleships. They're holding the Cristoforo Columbo back a knot slower than my battle line. It isn't much but I'll take it.

Their heavy cruiser turns away after mine smack him on the nose a couple of times with both nine and six inch guns. Even at the edge of their range, the Sankt Georg and Maria Theresia both prove better shots. And that's with the wind not in our favor. Ideally, you want to be down wind of your target - it keeps the smoke from your own smokestacks from interfering with your spotters and fire control adjustments. The Italian battle line though, seems determined to at least attempt to cross my T at some point.

Arpad similarly nails one of the Benedetto's at the edge of her range with her first volley. It's not enough to penetrate at this range unless it hit an extended part of the belt or the battery, but we're going to close in and give them a thwacking they won't forget.

Or we would if twilight wasn't upon us at the moment. This is going to be risky, but I'll keep going for the target.

The Italians start to turn away, and I punish them for it. Arpad and the Franz both score hits on their older battleships.

Good news. Even at 8000 yards, the Cristoforo can't damage the Wien, even hitting her with 13 inch guns on her belt extended. I know the Arpad's penetration is good enough to punch through ~10 inches at 7000 yards. I know how close I can get without risking my ships.

But night falls before I can use that knowledge. We'll be in knife fighting range with the Italians, and that's going to be more dangerous for me than it is for them. Still, we landed some good blows, and I will risk a pass at that land target even in the dark.

Or they can cross my T at 4000 yards. WELCOME TO PAIN ITALIAN SCUM!

At this close range, even my 11 inch guns will punch through 10 inches of armor most likely - and I know the Radetzky will penetrate. The Italians turn away into my destroyer line, but in the darkness my ships don't risk accidentally torpedoing my own battle line. Night fighting can be frustrating - and I don't think the Italians are going to risk another pass any time soon.

Or they do, and this time my destroyer is putting fish in the water. At close range. She's forced to turn away.

We approach the target in the dark. I'll only do one, maybe two passes on this son of a bitch, so I'm slowing my speed down to 10 knots - hopefully to maximize the time in sight range all my ships spend on this target. Frustratingly, they refuse to fire, despite clearly identifying it as the target.

SHIT SHIT SHIT TURN TURN TURN!

What a clusterfuck. The Kaiser takes a hit in her belt extended, but luckily her coal bunkers absorb the impact of the shell. Meanwhile that poor 'BC' I'm pretty sure is either an armored cruiser or the Columbo is getting absolutely pounded by my 11 inch guns at point blank range.

It's the Columbo! The brave destroyer Ulan is going toe to toe with her in the dark, and has launched a torpedo. It looks good!

Haha, YES! That'll put her out of action for at least a few months!

Ulan has put another fish in the water, and it looks just as good! Sadly it misses. Ulan is taking a beating, but if a 900 ton destroyer cripples an 18,800 ton battleship, that's a trade I'd take every time.

The Cristopher Columbo still wants some more, but she's wandered into the range of the Arpad, who's hanging back to support our brave destroyers. Her captain knows her guns, her range, and how much pain she can inflict. More point blank 12 inch hits are reported. She's been having a fantastic day today.

Everyone's lost track of everyone else tonight. My heavy cruisers are heading back towards port. My battle line has held together and traded more than favorably with the Italians under less than ideal conditions. I'm pulling back and away until sunrise. I don't know where the Italians are, but I do know that I landed some good hits on them. Hopefully they'll retreat and let me finish off the bombardment target in the morning.

Ulan, our plucky little hero, has come out of a toe to toe fight with a battleship with minor damage. I circle around, giving it some time. Hopefully the Italians have gotten the message and fucked off.

Aw fuck, nope, THEY DIDN'T GET THE MESSAGE. FULL SPEED AND TURN AWAY.

Wien puts a full broadside out on a DD, and nails her with an 11 inch HE shell. That ship's fucked.

But then dawn breaks. Turn back in boys, we're chasing them off!

There's a lot of them and we're firing at point blank range here. Less than 5000 yards separate the enemy from my ships. Battle damage assessment of the Cristoforo Colombo shows she's in bad shape. She's only moving between 5 to 10 knots, and the Wien puts in another four 11 inch shells into her at close range before I start peeling away, pulling a turn to come around and cross the T again on the Italian battle line, before making a run on the land bombardment target.

11 and 12 inch shells rain down on it.

Objective accomplished. Time to circle around and make sure that Italian battleship is dead.

We've obviously sunk a couple of ships, and that DD nearby is picking up survivors. Local fishing boats will rescue a lot as well, after the battle is over. We're very close to shore, even if the sea is rough.

The Cristoforo Columbo is now dead in the water. I'm running low on ammunition, so I can't guarantee a kill, but with the rain and the sea state as it is, she's likely going to sink. I pull away, and leave her to her fate. I trade a few more shots with the Italian battle line, but slip away from them in the rain. We're going home.

We absolutely thrashed the Italian navy. The Salamander took some serious damage in the fighting, but she survived. All but the Arpad suffered minor damage and will need repairs but it shouldn't hurt us for long.

A look at the statistics shows some rather astonishing stuff. Our battle line hit their marks 71 times. Cut that in half to account for shore bombardment, and that's still 9 times more than the Italians could hit us. The Wien hit her mark 4.33% of the time - an excellent showing, even considering her shore bombardment performance. An excellent showing all around.

We gained two prestige from that victory, which isn't too surprising. We sunk the only battleship Italy had in service. For at least a year or so, we own the Adriatic. The Wien will be in repairs for a month, our destroyers a bit longer, and we lost our blockade, but hot damn it's worth it when you absolutely dominate your enemies. The newspapers dub the victory the 'Battle off Vieste,' despite most of the fighting happening in the Gulf of Manfredonia.

We're under blockade now, with the Wien in the docks, but the damage is done. We've got them on the back foot.

**********

This battle was extremely fun for me. It was tense, touch and go, and really could have gone either way if I wasn't lucky enough to spot and shoot the Italians first. Ulan's captain deserves a medal or two for that ballsy point blank gun duel and torpedo run on the Colombo. He's likely to get rewarded with the Order of the Iron Crown, Third Class (at least), making him a knight. A Knight of the Iron Crown was one hell of a thing to be. Just the name alone is great.

 

[NerdShamer]

Great job shitting on the Italians, but I bet that the Brits and the Russians aren't very happy with you. But then again, Italy's military was kind of terrible around this time.

 

[Adamska]

Jesus Christ, the Ulan didn't quite pull a Golden BB on that Italian Dreadnought but it definitely did a number on it with that amazingly aimed fish. That captain deserves a fucking medal. Also I find it satisfying that the Regio Marina got cucked by the KuK; that feeling when you got wrecked by a country that still used bronze fucking cannons at this point in the army and considered the navy pretty much pointless beyond contesting the Adriatic/National pride.

Also GG on being involved the War that Tests Dreadnoughts man; IRL a lot of naval spectators would be very interested in the clash between the two. Notice you're going a very German approach with the heavies, which I completely understand.

Also bet you are super jazzed about getting those torp discoveries since that fish hit huh?

 

[GnomeofDoc]

It looks good!

Ha! Take that you pasta nigga!
The Captain of the Ulan just fucking knifed that nibba in the leg and ran off with all his pasta into the morning dawn.

We should nominate a name for said captain of the Ulan (I have not played this game so I don’t know if you can give them a name) like Jonas “Back Breaker” Herrmann.

 

[Adamska]

That cap does deserve a name. Hilariously I do %d when it comes to generation, and I rolled an 88. Using the languages of the shitshow that was the Hapsburg realms, this makes the crazy bastard a Romanian. Though more realistically he'd probably just be German or Hungarian, maaaybe Croat. Pasta would not be an option due to Italian irredentism.

 

[Techpriest]

Jesus Christ, the Ulan didn't quite pull a Golden BB on that Italian Dreadnought but it definitely did a number on it with that amazingly aimed fish. That captain deserves a fucking medal. Also I find it satisfying that the Regio Marina got cucked by the KuK; that feeling when you got wrecked by a country that still used bronze fucking cannons at this point in the army and considered the navy pretty much pointless beyond contesting the Adriatic/National pride.

Also GG on being involved the War that Tests Dreadnoughts man; IRL a lot of naval spectators would be very interested in the clash between the two. Notice you're going a very German approach with the heavies, which I completely understand.

Also bet you are super jazzed about getting those torp discoveries since that fish hit huh?

Very jazzed. And yes, this battle likely proved a lot of assumptions completely and totally incorrect.

Great job shitting on the Italians, but I bet that the Brits and the Russians aren't very happy with you. But then again, Italy's military was kind of terrible around this time.

You're right, they're not happy. Britain has two battlecruisers currently stationed in the Mediterranean in case the A-H admiralty gets crazy enough to challenge them. I don't care about Russia - Germany and France would blockade them immediately in a war and I'd laugh as they starve to death. They can't send warships through the Bosphorus. I can blockade Russian shipping into the Black Sea with even a minor screening force.

Ha! Take that you pasta nigga!
The Captain of the Ulan just fucking knifed that nibba in the leg and ran off with all his pasta into the morning dawn.

We should nominate a name for said captain of the Ulan (I have not played this game so I don’t know if you can give them a name) like Jonas “Back Breaker” Herrmann.

That cap does deserve a name. Hilariously I do %d when it comes to generation, and I rolled an 88. Using the languages of the shitshow that was the Hapsburg realms, this makes the crazy bastard a Romanian. Though more realistically he'd probably just be German or Hungarian, maaaybe Croat. Pasta would not be an option due to Italian irredentism.

A Romanian, huh? Likely scraped his way into navy college out of luck (and because everyone else wanted into the army) and a bribe or two from a rich uncle. Considering the multicultural nature of the Austrian empire at this time, I could easily see it happening. Do you have a good Romanian name laying around? Because this man would be over every newspaper in Europe, at least mentioned. Amazing propaganda too.

 

[Adamska]

A Romanian, huh? Likely scraped his way into navy college out of luck (and because everyone else wanted into the army) and a bribe or two from a rich uncle. Considering the multicultural nature of the Austrian empire at this time, I could easily see it happening. Do you have a good Romanian name laying around? Because this man would be over every newspaper in Europe, at least mentioned. Amazing propaganda too.

Courtesy of BehindtheName.com, I'm going with Constantin Alexandrescu until otherwise noted.

I imagine the Italian PM just wanting to neck himself right now, since this war is guaranteed going to have him lose a colony or two, and maybe even some adjustments to the French Border and in the Trentino region (Valle d'Aosta is going back probably). Expect some reeeing and Mutilata being screamed out.

 

[Techpriest]

The events of the 15-16th of February, 1912, were initially confused. Signals from the cruisers K.u.K. Maria Theresia and the Sankt Georg when they encountered Austrian destroyers on coastal patrol duty indicated they'd been separated by nightfall from the battle line, and feared the worst, as they'd not seen them for over twelve hours before finally returning to port in Spalato. Italian battle assessment was unsure of damage caused to the SMS Wien, and SMS Kaiser, as both were hit by 13 inch shells. Moderate damage was assumed on both, and at least three enemy destroyers sunk or crippled. The Cristoforo Colombo sunk as it was being tugged back towards Bari by the Giulio Cesare, the damage of the torpedo hits and battering to the superstructure proving too much for the ship to take. Taking in water, the survivors were shuffled off in heavy storms, assisted by local fishing vessels. Around 800 sailors were missing, assumed dead. 149 would report to duty over the next couple of weeks, having either been picked up by small fishing vessels or swimming to land. By the end of March, the remaining were marked as Killed in Action.

On the Austrian side, as the battle fleet slipped into Cattaro as dusk fell, optimism was running high. The target was without question destroyed - the secondaries from the ammo factory going off could be seen from miles, and every single Austrian ship was accounted for at the end of the day. They knew they had also at the very least, severely damaged the only Italian dreadnought in service. More news would filter in over the next day, as spies on both sides sent telegrams and reports all over the world. Within the week, the news was out, despite the Italian propaganda. The New York Times headlined story was circulated far and wide. "ITALIAN BATTLESHIP SUNK; AUSTRIAN NAVY WINS ENGAGEMENT OFF RESORT TOWN OF VIESTE." This of course was followed by overwhelming dramatization of gunfire off of a peaceful sleepy Italian village, swarthy sailors struggling in high seas, and a battle that ran through the whole night. Not much of it was true, but the readers ate it up.

The world had been watching. The British naval attache to the Italians commented, in a confidential telegram to London, "If the Italians could build ships half as well as they attempt to deflect the blame, our boots would be shaking with fear, not laughter." Reports of the battle were studied and looked over for any hints at what decided this first engagement of dreadnoughts. Strategists pointed towards the close ranges of night to the reason for the battering of the Cristoforo Colombo. No destroyer would have risked coming that close in the the day time. The weather, and the damage done by the lucky torpedo hit had been the blow that lead to the isolation and destruction of the Cristoforo Colombo.

Speaking of that destroyer, the SMS Ulan, it's 34 year old captain, Constantin Alexandrescu, was an instant hero in the Austro-Hungarian press. Archduke Franz Ferdinand knighted him in a ceremony in Budapest. The Romanian officer was an unlikely new member of the nobility, having earned a spot in the naval college from both the funds of his farming family and rich, industrialist uncle. Now, he was a Knight of the Iron Crown of Lombardy, Awarded with Swords and Wreath for valor in combat.

------

I'll write this sort of thing for every major battle, if people want it.

 

[GnomeofDoc]

I'll write this sort of thing for every major battle, if people want it.

I would like it quite a lot. This type of in world lore really helps tie the whole thing down and make it even better to watch.

 

[NerdShamer]

Plus, it showcases how a single mistake fucks up everyone else in the field of naval warfare.

 

[Techpriest]

I would like it quite a lot. This type of in world lore really helps tie the whole thing down and make it even better to watch.

Plus, it showcases how a single mistake fucks up everyone else in the field of naval warfare.

Good to hear. I’d also like to hear feedback on a few designs I’m making later on, to make the let’s play a bit more interactive. Then again, that sounds like the perfect thing for a France playthrough - every ship designed according to whatever naval philosophy happens to be popular that week.

 

[GnomeofDoc]

Good to hear. I’d also like to hear feedback on a few designs I’m making later on, to make the let’s play a bit more interactive. Then again, that sounds like the perfect thing for a France playthrough - every ship designed according to whatever naval philosophy happens to be popular that week.

Ship wise. I am by no means an expert, but to keep it RP friendly...

Dear Admiral Null,
My name is (I don’t know, we will have to make a good meme name up for the head of the Naval purse strings so we can curse and praise him as we get / lose naval budget) and as you know I head the Diet’s commission on Naval Affairs. I wish to congratulate you on on your victory over the Italians in your most recent of engagements.

But, we do have a request for you and that would be to create the future of Armored Cruisers a Battle Cruiser would be a better name to assert our dominance in the Adriatic Sea and our future of domination of the Mediterranean.

This new class of ship should have its primary guns be of no less then 10 inch and no more then 13.
These guns are required to be placed in turrets of no less then two guns per turrets at minimum and a max of 4. We require two turrets only to keep the weight and the price more importantly down.
We leave the secondary up to what you deem necessary.
Due to our national pride this ship must. I repeat must be built in our own ship yards. I can not tell you the national disgrace it would cause to have this built in foreign ports.

As a final request, my cousin was in America and was reading about “The Flight at Kitty Hawk” and has throughly convinced me of the potential future these craft might have on naval wars. While this technology is a ways off from being viable. Leave room in the design for any possible way our engineers can figure out how to utilize this technology.

And need I not warn you that the British are not happy with our current success against their friends the Italians and the French won’t always be there to block for us. This design must be done soon (I don’t know 2-5 years? Give a suggestion) so we can blunt this great threat against not only our interests, but our new allies Germany.

Sincerely,
(Name we make up here)